WORKSHOPS AT CBJA

The Center for Beadwork & Jewelry Arts, in Nashville, Tennessee, offers a full program of classes and workshops in bead weaving, bead stringing, wire working, silversmithing and the business of craft.
For information or registration, contact us at (615) 292-0610, or beadschool@landofodds.com
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Posts Tagged ‘design focus’

It is easy to get distracted. Dagmar sent me an email with a link to a picture of a bead woven piece she liked. At first, I reacted with some resistance, to click the link. I needed to finish up several projects, and didn’t want to cloud my thinking, or add one more image or one more pattern I liked, or color I liked, or technique I liked, to that mix of ideas and tasks and things swirling around and around in my head.

But, you guessed it, I clicked. The piece was beautiful, intriguing, and l discovered many more of this artist’s work on display online. I spent time with each piece. I read the artist’s statement because I wanted to learn more about her inspiration. She had many embedded links in her statement. Which led me to many other websites. One concept was discussed, and I did a Google search on that. And then an images.google.com search on it as well. Which somehow got me over to Amazon, then Wikipedia, and over to some other bead artist’s website.

Three hours later – how does time pass away so quickly? A simple click three hours earlier had led me through the looking glass and down the rabbit hole, through, what must have looked like to others, some torturous pathways, meeting all kinds of strangers.

I am always working on several projects at a time. So in my head, are several sets of instructions, several color palettes, several understandings of inspiration. And I want to keep some focus. And I want to finish all of these projects. And I want to be able to conceptualize and invent my next projects, which involves lots of trial and error experimentation. I want to have the time and clear head space for all this.

And yet, there are so many easily accessible distractions.

I know I’m not alone, so the question I put forward to you:

How do you stay focused?

And perhaps, I should phrase the question differently: Can you stay focused?

Or, in the face of so many great examples of jewelry and bead art, so many evolving changes in styles and fashions, the introduction of many new colors and new bead shapes and new techniques – in the face of so much wonderfully inspiring, so many things to learn and educate yourself about – how do you keep in touch with your inner designer self, and find the time and energy for self-expression?